Round 2 and I'm back for more...

So the Deathwing are gaining momentum in this summers’ WH40k League at my LGS. I have played three games league so far and I am ranked in the top five out of eighteen players. I’m really hoping that I can keep up this up as my goal is to finish in the top ten or higher. Now I will be the first to admit that my last two games have been played against younger more inexperienced players but at this point I’ll take what I can get.

We started Round 2 of the league this past weekend and I played a 1500pt. game against and new player to our store. I believe he has been playing for a while now as he had most of his Space Marine army fully painted and table ready. He had an interesting list which included Scouts, Landspeeders, Tac Marines, Rhino’s and Razorbacks. He even brought along a Land Raider and a Librarian in Terminator armor. My army was the same one that I mentioned and play tested last week.

The mission was Secure and Control with Dawn of War deployment and this time I didn’t make the mistake of leaving a squad on the objective to be sniped all game. I deployed first and setup two squads with Belial right on the line across from his objective marker. He setup his troops along his table edge but not completely out of Stormbolter range. During my first turn I walked/ran the Dreadnaughts towards my objects from the table edge and had the Land Raider Crusader go flat out to be in a better position next turn. I deepstriked (Deathwing Assault) my third squad onto his left flank and then all three squads opened up into his two squads. I wounded quite a few models but he made most of the save and only lost six models between the two squads. On his turn he brought in everything else but was forced to spread out his models which caused his to place the Land Raider, a Rhino and a Razorback within closing distance of my new arrived Terminator squad. He opened up on my squads and even had the librarian try a psychic attack but I only lost one man in Belial’s squad.

On turn two, I moved two squads up and annihilated the Librarian and his squad in a combination of shooting and close combat attacks. The Venerable Dreadnaught fired his Missile Launcher and Lascannon but didn’t crack the Land Raiders armor. I moved the LR Crusader up took a shot at the Razorback but that didn’t do much either. The third Terminator squad opened up and then assaulted the Razorback and turned it into a crater. My opponent opened up on my two squads and killed one more from Belail’s first squad but I made saves on the guys wounded in the second squad. He tried to shoot my third squad but didn’t do any damage. His Land Raider opened up on my Venerable Dreadnaught and caused a Shaken affect for the next round. He also Deepstriked a five-man squad of Assault Marines near my third squad but there shots were easily saved by the Terminators.

In turn three things changed drastically as my LR Crusader and third squad eliminated the Assault Marine while Belial’s first squad eliminated a five-man Scout squad. They shot up and then assault the scouts but stayed locked in CC until his turn. At that point they wiped out the unit and moved closer to another Tac squad. My second squad shot into his Stern Guard squad and then charged into them killing several but they remained locked as well. I lost one member of that squad to a powerfist so they were down to four men in that squad. During his third turn, he brought in a Landspeeder and tried to take out my LR Crusader with a multi-melta but it failed to hit. He piled in another Tac squad into to assist his Stern Guard and ended up taking out the Sergeant and Assault Cannon Terminator but not before he lost his remaining Stern Guard members. Belial’s squad finished off the scouts and advanced toward his second squad to assist.

Turn four, the LR Crusader and regular Dreadnaught eliminated the Landspeeder while the third squad took out the Rhino. He didn’t move it last turn so they auto-hit and blew that one up as well. Belial’s first and second squads eliminated the remaining Tac squad and began moving towards his objective marker. The Tac squad took several of the Terminators with them so both first and second squads had only two Terminators apiece remaining. On his turn, he moved the Land Raider towards his objective and too a Lascannon shot at my Venerable Dreadnaught blowing it to pieces, thankfully nothing was close so no additional wounds were caused. He bought in his second Landspeeder and tried to take out the LR Crusader again but again his dice failed him.

Turn Five would prove to be very interesting for both of us; my LR Crusader destroyed his Landspeeder in a hail of bolter, assault cannon and multi-melta fire. He had a Rhino and Land Raider left and first, second and third squads were able to wreck the Land Raider; got to love those power and chain fists. It looked as I if had won the game at this point but my opponent decide to tank shock his remaining Rhino into my three squads. This caused both of us to scratch our heads and review the rules because he was attempting to hit three different squads. Now the Rhino had no weapons and all my Terminators were fearless so with a little assistance in rules clarification from another Veteran player, we moved on to the carnage. So the first squad was unable to stop the Rhino as the first squad had no powerfists and they didn’t get a ‘6’ on their armor pen test. They moved aside and second squad made their attacks. They had both a power and chain fist and they were able to get two Immobilized results which wrecked the tank and stopped it about four inches from the objective.

It was a great game and I think I learned two valuable lessons in that I shouldn’t have ignored the Rhino earlier in the game and that I should have spread out my units to surrounds the objective a little better. Because had I done either, he would have been in a position to Tank Shock the units so close to the objective. It was hairy there for a bit because a Draw result would have bumped me lower in the rankings and it would have caused me difficulty in the later rounds.
I’m looking forward to next weekend so that I can get another game in and hopefully come out ahead in this round as well. I know that as the league escalates, I’ll have a much harder time in dealing with the newer army’s and their various Death Star units.

Cheers…